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Adhir Chowdhury’s daughter Shreyashi in her south Calcutta flat on Tuesday. Picture by Pradip Sanyal. |
Calcutta, Nov. 22: Her father is in jail and mother wanted.
Adhir and Arpita Chowdhury’s only child Shreyashi, 17, however has no complaints against them.
Sitting in her father’s plush flat in a multi-storeyed off Gol Park, the 17-year-old said: “I feel genuinely sorry for Manju Bewa, who lost her husband and son, but I want to tell her with folded hands that neither my father nor my mother was involved in the killings.”
The Behrampore MP was arrested from his official residence in Delhi on Saturday on charges of complicity in the double murder.
As Chowdhury spent his third day in the district town’s central jail surrounded by followers, his daughter appealed to the widow to “understand” the trouble her family was facing. “Deep inside, I know my parents are in no way connected with such a heinous act. They have been framed, and I want her to understand my pathetic condition.”
After passing out of St John’s Diocesan School, Shreyashi is studying computers at a private institute.
Her parents have at various points said what Shreyashi told The Telegraph today. “We all have become pawns in the political chessboard. My parents are victims of a deep-rooted conspiracy?.”
Arpita is undergoing treatment in a clinic in Hyderabad.
“I wonder how my mother who spends most of her time attending to pets could turn a murderer,” Shreyashi said.
“Look, I don’t know what is politics, but I know well enough that certain people, envious of my father’s rising popularity in the district, have been trying to harm him for some time.”
Murshidabad superintendent of police Niraj Kumar Singh said in Behrampore this afternoon that the MP has 25-26 cases pending against him since the 1970s. “In most cases, police have filed chargesheets.”
“I am not bothered,” said Shreyashi. “They are my best friends, guides and philosophers.” Will she go to see her father in jail? No, she said. “What will I tell him?”